Anticipation is often the hardest part of things that are scary or hard. I have been thinking about this a lot lately as I reminisce about summer adventures past.

Flying alone for the first time comes to mind. I hadn’t flown at all in years when I found myself planning to meet my Wyoming friend Johnna in Salt Lake City in 2018. I didn’t worry about it but the idea made me uncomfortable right up until the moment I was settled into my United Flight window seat. That’s when I discovered that flying alone was the most liberating experience of my life. 

Another thing that comes to mind is my visit to Mesa Verde National National Park in southwest Colorado. This UNESCO World Heritage Site is known for beautifully preserved Ancestral Puebloan cliff dwellings. Honestly, I had never heard of it until Johnna suggested it as part of our four corners region adventure. 

She and her hubby had driven through one day, stopping at an overlook to watch a ranger led tour explore one of the cliff dwellings. She talked about the beauty of the place and the exciting prospects of exploring ancient dwellings that not everyone can touch. Access is permitted only through ranger hikes. 

We agreed this would be the centerpiece of our trip until we discovered one small detail: to access the cliff dwellings, you have to climb ladders.

“Wait… what?” I asked.

Ladders? I don’t do ladders. I don’t do heights. I don’t do things that might result in my passing out or tripping and falling to my death. I am not the most graceful of our population so it seems a likely outcome that I will trip and hurl myself off the side of a cliff.

There are tours to three dwellings. The Square Tower House descends 120 feet and has steep drop-offs. You have to climb two 16 foot ladders and be able to scramble over large boulders, unassisted while carrying a minimum half gallon of water. All this for the bargain low price of $25 per person.

Just reading that description gave me heart palpitations so I crossed that off the list. 

Balcony House is just $8 per person but requires climbing a 32-foot ladder, crawling through an 18 inch by 27 inch tall tunnel for twelve feet and climbing a 66 foot open cliff face with uneven stone steps. All that before climbing two 18 foot ladders to exit.

Nope. What else they got? 

The final tour goes to Cliff Palace. It  descends uneven stone steps and requires climbing four 8-10 foot ladders. This one is also $8. 

Honestly, I would have paid the total sum of all three tour tickets to not have to do any this. But my dear friend Johnna knew exactly what to say to get me to agree to this. It was something to the effect of “do you want to be one of those people on the overlook watching others live life or do you want to be one of those people down there having fun? It just depends on the kind of life you want.”

Sigh. 

So I spent the next couple of months experiencing self inflicted vertigo every time I thought about what was to come. I hardly slept the night before and had a knot in my stomach right up until we began descending those stone steps. 

You know something? I hustled right up the first ladder with no trouble and just kept going. Honestly, the ladders weren’t bad even though the first one looks like something Fred Flinstone might have built. But it was eight feet and on the ground, angled enough that it didn’t feel like too severe of a climb.

The way out required some uneven stone steps and a ten foot ladder that went straight up. However, it wasn’t at all scary because it was in a crevice between stone so it felt sheltered.

I drag you along on that adventure to tell you this: the fear of what is to come is nearly always worse than the thing you have to do. That’s true for sad anniversaries and for hard work you procrastinate because you simply don’t want to do it. It’s true for those irrational fears we all have as well.

Your mind will always make things worse than they seem if you allow it.

I’m grateful that I did it and (don’t tell Johnna) I’m grateful she pushed me to go. She’s a good influence because she knows I’m capable of more than I think and doesn’t hesitate to force me to at least try. 

Want to read another account of Mesa Verde? The Wandering Canadians recently wrote a nice account that sent these particular memories bubbling to the top. Click here to read all about their visit!